Calgary to celebrate Sochi heroes with parade, gala

Val Fortney, Calgary Herald05.30.2014

Canadian Olympic Speed Skater Denny Morrison, with teammate Gilmore Junio, who gave up his spot so Morrison could compete and ultimately win a silver medal in the Sochi Olympics. (Calgary Herald/Files)Colleen De Neve Colleen De Neve
/ Calgary Herald

Not winning an Olympic medal was the best thing to happen to Gilmore Junio.

That certainly wasn’t what the Calgary speedskater had envisioned, though, when he hopped on a plane this past February for the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics. It also wasn’t in his sights when he gave up his spot in the men’s 1,000 metre long-track event to his friend and fellow athlete Denny Morrison, who would go on to capture silver in that race, later adding a bronze in the men’s 1,500 metres.

“Going in, I definitely wanted to come home with some hardware,” says the 23-year-old native Calgarian Thursday just before heading to training at Canada Olympic Park’s WinSport facility. “It was a tough decision for my dreams, an easy one for the team.”

What happened next is now the stuff of Olympic lore: Junio’s selfless act made headlines around the world and garnered him and Morrison interviews on major TV networks across the continent. Earlier this month, he was recognized with a commemorative medal, crowd-funded by people from across the country. On June 13, he’ll be a featured speaker at the fifth annual TedxYYC event, just one of the many appearances he on already his packed 2014 schedule.

It was what happened behind the scenes, though, that has had the biggest impact on Junio. While he remained blissfully ignorant of his growing fame outside the confines of Sochi, in the hours and days following he found himself the recipient of overwhelming appreciation and support from fellow athletes, coaches and other members of the Olympic family.

“As athletes we’re perfectionists — I could have been left with a bitter taste in my mouth,” he says. Instead, he took that afterglow to the next two World Cups, where he would enjoy some of his best racing and win silver and bronze medals in the men’s 500 metres. “It made me look at my sport in a much more positive, jovial way,” he explains. “I was able to be both more relaxed and more focused, to just go out and do it.”

Junio wishes his fellow athletes could all feel the love like he did in Sochi. “It’s crazy because there are so many people on the Canadian team that won medals and should be getting more attention,” he says. “Everyone should have the kind of experience I had.”

While they can’t turn back the hands of time, the Canadian Olympic Committee and Canadian Paralympic Committee will attempt next week to recreate some of that Olympic magic with a three-day Celebration of Excellence, an opportunity for Canadians to show their appreciation for those athletes who spend years training for a shot at the podium, along with the athletes reaching out and giving back to the wider community.

As part of the Heroes Tour, around 200 athletes will visit schools and hospitals in several Canadian communities before stopping in Calgary for a June 6 Parade of Champions hosted by the City of Calgary.

The tour will also include a Canadian Olympic Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony and a sold-out evening gala, with funds raised going to programs supporting the next generation of future sports stars.

While the eight-year-old Celebration of Excellence program is the brainchild of COC president Marcel Aubut, many have credited its presence in our city this year to lobbying efforts by a Calgary team led by power couple Lois and Doug Mitchell, the latter a member of the Canadian Olympic Foundation board, along with Calgary Flames president Ken King and Steve Williams, president and CEO of Suncor Energy.

“The Sochi Olympics brought Canada together,” says Lois Mitchell, who on the day we speak is busy finalizing silent auction items for the gala dinner. “This brings us all together again, to show them we think they’re amazing.”

Working closely with the Calgary Stampede and the City of Calgary, Mitchell says the team intend to roll out the red carpet with a distinctly Western hospitality feel.

“We’ll have an army of white hatters at the airport to greet them, hundreds of Stampede volunteers and of course a pancake breakfast,” she says of the festivities that get underway 90 minutes before the 11:30 a.m. parade — led by Mayor Naheed Nenshi — that will work its way east along Eighth Avenue S.W. from 10th Street to Olympic Plaza, where a free outdoor show will include Olympians and Paralympians mingling with the crowd for autographs and photos.

Hayley Wickenheiser is one of those Olympians confident that with people like Lois Mitchell steering the ship, this will be a Celebration of Excellence for the history books. “Lois and Doug do so much for sport in this country, it’s only fitting that they’re a big part of this,” says the 35-year-old hockey legend that announced her retirement this year after helping her team capture gold at Sochi. “We get a lot of support from the public, so it’s also important for us athletes to get a chance to come out and show our thanks.”

In her 20 years in the sport, Wickeneheiser says she’s never experienced the kind of profile that Sochi recently brought. “Vancouver doesn’t even compare,” she says, noting she is recognized now more than ever, with people constantly stopping to tell her where they were when Team Canada’s women clinched the nail biter. “One surgeon told me he was in the middle of surgery and stopped it to catch the overtime,” she says with a laugh.

When he captured gold in the men’s 100-metre backstroke at the Barcelona 1992 Summer Olympics, Mark Tewksbury was also the toast of Canadians back home. In the midst of the Olympic flurry, though, he never got to fully celebrate his success with fellow Team Canada members. “You have this massive, unique experience in a bubble,” says the 46-year-old Calgarian that served as Canada’s chef de mission at the London 2012 Summer Olympics. “I didn’t have everyone to share it with, which made it extraordinarily lonely.”

This new approach, says Tewksbury, is in keeping with the public’s growing appreciation of Olympians and Paralympians in between games, something he sees as vital to nurturing future competitors. “It makes them feel valued and special,” he says. “In Vancouver, we felt like a unified team; it broke down those performance silos.”

One athlete looking forward to making up for lost time is Kyle Shewfelt. After he won gold in the men’s floor exercise at the Athens 2004 Summer Olympics, some pundits predicted he’d translate that into $1 million in endorsements.

The pot of gold failed to materialize and after an initial flurry of attention, the native Calgarian pretty much returned to the life he had before capturing Canada’s hearts. But you’ll find no trace of bitterness in the upbeat former athlete today that recently opened his own gym (kyleshewfeltgymnastics.com) and, like Tewksbury and Wickenheiser, keeps busy on the public speaking circuit.

“The Celebration of Excellence will extend that period, with athletes having something big to look forward to when they come home,” says the 32-year-old Shewfelt, who will be inducted into the Canadian Olympic Hall of Fame next week. “We have a parade for the Stanley Cup, for the Grey Cup, why shouldn’t we have one for Olympians and Paralympians?”

“There’s so much to be proud of, we should have been doing this years ago,” says Ken Read, a former downhill Olympian that until last year was director of winter sport for Own the Podium, a national non-for-profit that works with national sports organizations on investment strategies benefiting Canadian athletes. “I tip my hat to the Canadian Olympic Committee for realizing we need to be celebrating athletes more than just those 16 days of competition.”

One thing the 58-year-old former World Cup champion hopes comes out of this renewed public attention is greater interest in nurturing future generations of Canadian Olympians. “With Own the Podium, we transformed the elite levels of sport,” he says. He sees the system as desperately needing to examine levels of investment in future medal contenders. “We’re not replacing our current champions — we need to take a hard look, right now, at providing those on the tier below with critical support services.”

Even though he’s still basking in the afterglow of being one of the feel-good stories of Sochi, Junio is one of those athletes that hope to benefit from such increased interest.

“Going into the Pyeongchang games in 2018, it’ll be great to have the story and the attention,” says now-world famous poster boy for Olympic sportsmanship.

“It’s great to be known as that good guy, but I want be a medallist. As awesome as it was to share in Denny’s medal, it was his moment, his medal,” says Junio, who’s clearly set his sights on what hopes will be the next best thing in his life. “I want to create my own story.”

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